Charles Marion Russell

Charles M. Russell (1864-1926)
Excerpt from The American West Reimagined (2021)
By Dr. Larry Len Peterson

Charles M. Russell, the nostalgic, held tight memories of a youthful past when the West belonged to God. There was a sense of loss, as poignant as losing a loved one. The specter of what this loss meant loomed over Russell the rest of his life. He was the quintessential nostalgic who grabbed history and married it to idealized memory and imagination. For example, despite Russell never witnessing a buffalo hunt, it became the basis for his most popular and desired art. Nancy Russell explained, “No man can be a painter without imagination.”